East Lancashire Derby

The East Lancashire Derby (also known as "El Lanclassico" or the "Cotton Mills Derby" ) is a football match between Blackburn Rovers F.C. and Burnley F.C.. The nickname originates from the fact that Blackburn and Burnley were former mill towns.

The derby is one of the oldest and fiercest derby matches in the game. The first ever competitive league match between these two former English football champions and founder members of the Football League, took place at Turf Moor on 3 November 1888, Blackburn won the game 7–1. Blackburn also won the return fixture at Ewood Park 4–2. From a town standpoint there is an obvious geographical reason for the rivalry as the two Lancashire towns only lie 11 miles (18 km) apart. Accrington Stanley F.C. stands in the middle, but is not taken seriously as a rival by either. Another alleged reason for the increased hostilities is that Blackburn complained to the Football League about Burnley's illegal number of Scottish players in the 1890s.

Blackburn Rovers were founded in 1875 and in the following years, many other clubs were formed in the region such as Accrington F.C. in 1886 and Clitheroe Central in 1877, due to football being passionately taken up by the area. Another such club was Burnley Rovers, who started out as a rugby club until changing codes in 1882.